Monday, February 27, 2006

Monday musing

4. You get home and your front door is open. Run for your life and do not enter on your own. Call the security company, the police, the neighbours, but don't go in by yourself.5. You get home and there is a police officer waiting for you. This could be innocent, but then again they may either be the bearer of bad tidings or your past may finally have caught up with you.6. Your dog is growling in the night. Wild barking could be at a passerby or the moon or someone who is outside of your fence. Growling is usually reserved for something which is closer by, unexpected and which has frightened the dog. Call the security company or press the panic button.

Friday, February 24, 2006

Walking the line

Watched "Walk the Line" last night, fantastic. If Joaquin Phoenix doesn't win a best actor Oscar for that role, a great injustice will have been done: he owned it. Reese Witherspoon was great too, and even Robert "T1000" Patrick was surprisingly good. Best movie I've seen in a long time, that's for sure.

I did read a review to the effect that this is only an average movie unless you're a big Johnny Cash fan: bollocks, you could know nothing about the man and his music, and still find it fantastic. It's a story about the human condition: universal appeal.

Seeing a real musician like Johnny Cash being portrayed so well did make me reflect a little on the large proportion of contemporary "musicians" who can't read or write music, and rely on pathetic gimmicks like backup dancers. Fuck you, talentless hacks!

No need to be universally positive on this blog, there's always room for griping. On this note: to paraphrase one of the few contemporary musicians I admire, I still don't give a fuck about the "celebrity drug scandal". I see there's another "celebrity" being implicated now by the NZ media ... hey journos - give up, or go and get a job for a celebrity rag like the Woman's Weekly, you're talentless hacks too.

Wednesday, February 22, 2006

All bets are off

The New Zealand Warriors are set to be penalised four to six competition points and fined up to $A500,000 for salary cap rorts, dating back to at least 2004, which put the club more than $A500,000 over the $A3.25 million cap limit.The club's new management team is blaming the previous administration for secret player payments that have put the team's 2006 campaign at grave risk of becoming a disaster.Warriors chairman Maurice Kidd told the Sydney Morning Herald yesterday that when the management informed him of irregularities they had found, he reacted with "horror, shock and disbelief"."It pissed me off," Kidd said. "It was brought to my attention and then we immediately brought it to the attention of the NRL. The arrangements in question were made prior to the new administration coming in and we told the league we didn't know how this should be treated. It was a Pandora's box."

If the competition ran as close as it did last year there would be no way the Warriors could realisitically make the top 8 starting 3 matches down.

The Board of the Vodafone Warriors today announced it is working closely with the National Rugby League (NRL) to conduct a full investigation into squad player payments, after a number of potential discrepancies were uncovered in respect of the club’s salary cap. The potential discrepancies were discovered by Vodafone Warriors management during preparations for a standard pre-season follow-up audit by the NRL. Club chairman Maurice Kidd says the investigation relates to some player payments and arrangements negotiated prior to the appointment of the new management team – Chief Executive Wayne Scurrah, Executive Director, Football John Hart, and Head Coach Ivan Cleary – late last year. “We are in the process of clarifying the extent and current status of these arrangements and what obligations they may place on the club for the 2006 season and beyond, as well as any possible impact on the salary cap,” Kidd says.

Can I suggest punters don't unload on Warriors to make the top 8 at the current odds of $2.00.

In other, similarly sad news, I ask all bloggers to give a minute's silence for Yamis who will be shot tommorrow morning at dawn as a deserter.

Tuesday, February 21, 2006

Or are you just happy to see me?

I assume Scoop has mislabelled this press release as being authored by NZ Police, when really it is from the Greens, yet it's bloody interesting nonetheless:

Why are Police hosting pro-gun lobbyists?Tuesday, 21 February 2006, 10:34 amPress Release: New Zealand Police 21 February 2006Why are Police hosting international pro-gun lobbyists?The New Zealand Police need to explain why they are hosting this country's largest ever gathering of international pro-gun lobbyists, according to Green Party Police Spokesperson Keith Locke.Minister of Police Annette King will tonight open an "international firearms safety seminar" in Christchurch, co-sponsored by the New Zealand Police, the Mountain Safety Council and the NZ Council of Licensed Firearms Owners. But despite the apparent focus on safety, 5 of the 7 keynote speakers are prominent lobbyists opposed to gun control.Speakers at the conference include:- Mark Barnes, a registered Washington firearm industry lobbyist who declared having received US$360,000 from the National Rifle Association of America (NRA) in one year.* John R. Lott, the world's most controversial pro-gun researcher, who writes that the solution to school shootings is to arm the teachers, and whose recent book is titled More Guns, Less Crime.* Rick Patterson, Managing Director of the Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers' Institute (SAAMI), is an American gun industry lobbyist who spoke at the United Nations last month, arguing that US and other civilian gun owners should be exempt from international gun controls.* Colin Greenwood, a former UK police officer whose conference abstract says he will argue that the British handgun ban is "pathetic irrelevance".* Gary A. Mauser, a hard-line opponent of Canada's firearms registry."Under the guise of a firearms safety seminar the organisers have smuggled in pro-gun lobbyists. They need to come clean, both to the public and to the participants who genuinely think that this is a safety conference," Mr Locke says.

Friday, February 17, 2006

A case for narrowly-drawn criminal law

A British Columbian man is arrested for drinking a beer outside a hockey arena: a classically Canadian activity which is nonetheless falls foul of the criminal law, which prohibits drinking in public places. He ends up being shot in the back of the head in police custody. "Fuck" is, I imagine, a common reaction.

Leaving aside the massive unanswered question of how the shooting managed to unfold, one might also ask why (the fuck) are police arresting people for drinking beer outdoors? The answer being that they are empowered to do so, and in a small town like Houston, BC, they will exercise that power due to boredom/underemployment/nothing better to do.

And therein lies the problem with all the petty criminal offences that apologists and conservatives justify on the basis that "oh, the police will exercise discretion in enforcing that law." Possession of marijuana for personal use springs to mind. "Discretion" in enforcement is really just another word for arbitrary justice, and a recipe for arrests along the following lines: (a) in larger cities, anyone the police want an excuse to stop, search and arrest, etc. when they have the time (e.g., young brown males); (b) in smaller centres, anyone the police want to arrest when they're bored or otherwise looking for something to do.

The easiest way to prevent such injustice is to narrowly tailor the criminal law so as to prohibit only those activities which are manifestly incompatible with the rights of others in a free and democratic society. Under this test, the law could prohibit "drunk and disorderly behaviour" in a public place, but not mere consumption of alcohol. It is likely prize fighting would also be allowed. Idiot/Savant might also have a few words to say about the "Sedition" provision.

The UN report also focuses on a relatively new area of concern in Guantánamo - the resort to violent force-feeding to end a hunger strike by inmates. Guards at Guantánamo began force-feeding the protesters last August, strapping them on stretchers and inserting large tubes into their nasal passages, according to a lawyer for Kuwaiti detainees who has had contact with the UN envoys.The effort to break the hunger strike has accelerated since the UN envoys produced their draft, with inmates strapped in restraint chairs for hours and fed laxatives so that they defecate on themselves."The government is not doing things to keep them alive. It is really conducting tactics to deprive them of the ability to be on hunger strike because the hunger strike is an embarrassment to them," said Thomas Wilner, an attorney at the Washington firm Shearman & Sterlin, who represents several Kuwaiti detainees.The report adds to a body of evidence about mistreatment. A report by the International Committee of the Red Cross last year said interrogation techniques there were "tantamount to torture".

Justice Department spokesman Mark Corallo said the government stood behind President George Bush's assertion that the Geneva Conventions did not apply to members of al-Qaida and said with the ruling, "the judge has put terrorism on the same legal footing as legitimate methods of waging war". Most of the 550 prisoners at Guantanamo were classified as enemy combatants before they arrived at the US prison camp. It was only after a Supreme Court decision in June that allowed them to challenge their detentions in a federal court that the government established the Combatant Status Review Tribunals to evaluate their cases.

The United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan has told the BBC the US-led invasion of Iraq was an illegal act that contravened the UN charter.He said the decision to take action in Iraq should have been made by the Security Council, not unilaterally.

Tuesday, February 14, 2006

Just thank god you're not an Aussie

Man how shitty is this - your kid is getting himself into something terrible so you tip off the authorities in a frantic bid to help him.

The Aussie Police respond by letting him head straight over to Bali and then tip off the Indonesian police who set a trap and ensure your kid never sees his homeland again.

SCOTT Rush's parents suspected their son was headed for disaster, but were powerless to prevent it.In Denpasar district court yesterday, Lee and Christine Scott sat in silently as the judge, I Made Sudia, imposed a life sentence on the 20-year-old.Afterwards, they delivered a glaring indictment of the Australian Government.Mr and Mrs Rush said they had turned to the Australian police believing it would prevent their son from smuggling drugs. Instead, he was arrested in Bali with heroin strapped to his body.When a travel agent left a message with Rush early last year to tell him his ticket to Bali was ready, his parents had a feeling something was wrong: their son had no passport and little money.

A small group of Indonesian anti-narcotics protesters gathered at the court this morning and unveiled banners demanding the judges ``send them to hell''.

Can anyone say "get a life you backward cocksuckers" three times fast?

In other news a little closer to home the New Zealand Herald did its part last week to demonise an Auckland surgeon accused -- hear that accused -- of knowingly selling tablets for use in the manufacture of a class A drug.

The driving force behind a former Auckland cardiologist's involvement in black market sales of drugs for methamphetamine manufacture was simply greed, the Crown prosecutor told Auckland District Court today. In his closing remarks on the final day of the jury trial of Xiao-Zhong Chen, 55, Crown prosecutor David McNaughton said Chen was a highly respected cardiologist who had been denied recognition in New Zealand's medical circles because he was foreign. "He had been held back and he had to prove himself to the old boys' club," Mr McNaughton said.

McNaughton even managed to have a dig at those plebs who work in the public health system too:

"This meant the accused was still working in the public hospital system while his other colleagues were out playing golf."

There was just one little problem with McNaugthon's "case" he was absolutely 100% full of shit.

Days after the screaming NZ Herald front page article which painted Chen as Dr Evil, we hear that the jury took less than half an hour to chuck out the Crown's case and learn that:

At an emotional party last night to celebrate his acquittal on all charges of supplying a decongestant for the manufacture of methamphetamine, or P, Dr Chen said: "I love my job, and I just want it back." While working in Auckland, Dr Chen performed 1200 heart operations and 300 lung operations, a number described as astonishing by colleagues. But he has been without income since December 2004 and has no guarantee of getting his job back. "That is the next war," said former colleague Alan Kerr.

Oh and then there was these comments that had been made "earlier in the trial" but had somhow not made it onto the Herald's front page hatchet job:

Character testimony from colleagues and family portrayed him as honest but naive and unworldly - due to the amount of time he spent working. His wife, Wendy Tang, testified that her husband was so dedicated to work, he took textbooks on their honeymoon. The court also heard how work - not money - was what made him happy.

And finally:

Not being able to work has been difficult. "I want to work," he said. "I enjoy every day, weekend and night, working in the hospital." Dr Kerr said Dr Chen was "a truly first-class surgeon". "If he isn't re-employed, it would be a big loss to New Zealand medicine."

So it turns out there was no desire to "prove himself" to the old boys club, there was no desire to be out playing golf with the private health , there was no greed it was just a unworldly quack who loved, and lived, to save New Zealanders lives.

Ordinary New Zealanders like me and you.

All the while, the police prosecutor was lying through his fucking teeth.

Monday, February 13, 2006

More Curious Questions (In the Bennyasena tradition)

2. Why are certain people unable to distinguish between the actions of individuals and institutions, and the nation state from which they originate, or in which they are based?

First, certain flag- and embassy-burners cannot distinguish between the actions of newspaper editors and contributors, and the nation state in which those persons are based. If an Australian individual was to offer some grave insult to New Zealanders, I'd hope we would be mature enough to distinguish between that individual and Australia as a state. But then...

Second, certain South Islanders turn up their lips in a convincing imitation of a rabid rotweiller when hearing what they think is an "American" accent, presumably due to their dislike of American politics or foreign policy. To mis-quote a local institution, "get over it you fucking inbred white trash zenophobes".

3. Why do I get the serious impression that most NZ-based TV productions (including news and advertisements) are intended for 6 year olds? Stop talking down to me you fucking pricks. Yes, I'm talking about you Brand Power, and you too Kate Hawkesby.

Thursday, February 09, 2006

Pigs

Anna Claridge in The Press reports that the number of speeding tickets issued has trebled since 1999. The Police hierarchy have said the massive jump in tickets is the result of targeted road safety campaigns, but the problem is they are not targeted at all. Targeting is not issuing tickets to every single motorist who drives past, over the limit and tolerance.The police in Hawke's Bay were so busy with their speed traps, that they took hours to come out to an unexplained death at the beach. The poor person who had to wait with the body commented "It would seem that, increasingly, the only way to access any service from the police is to drive at 111kmh on the open road."

Wednesday, February 08, 2006

Yeah!

Missing diver Robert Hewitt has been found alive after three days in the water.The former Navy diver was spotted from the Police Launch Lady Elizabeth III shortly after 4pm today near Mana Island and pulled from the water. He had spent more than 72 hours in the water. Officials said he was conscious, dehydrated and needing medical attention. Family watched and wept as Robert Hewitt, was placed in a waiting ambulance at the Mana Cruising Club north of Wellington tonight. His fiancee Rangi and youngest daughter hugged the police and navy divers who found the 38-year-old former navy diver in the water off Mana Island.Mr Hewitt went missing on Saturday and his All Black brother Norm Hewitt had said family accepted he would not be coming back.

In other breaking news I see the Dom Post and Press have apologised for causing offence - about time too it was never our battle.

Freezin' it Real

Greetings from the land of (near) perpetual winter, Dunedin, where today the citizenry has dragged out the coats, hats and gloves they put away in late December, thinking they might receive at least a couple of months reprieve from the sub-Antarctic climate. I kid you not. According to the weather station on the top of the University Clock Tower, it's currently 13.6 degrees ... although with the windchill and general damp I'd swear it feels no more than 11.